Andreas Renschler may head Volkswagen’s trucks business

Recently resigned Mercedes-Benz production chief Andreas Renschler may be hired by Volkswagen Group to head its trucks business, according to a report by Stuttgarter Zeitung, citing company sources. The daily said that Renschler has received ''an attractive job offer'' from another German carmaker and was likely to head VW's trucks business, which also includes Scania and MAN.

Renschler was head of Daimler's truck business for almost nine years, managing investments in emerging markets like Russia and India before being named as Mercedes production chief in April 2013. In a recent statement, Daimler said Renschler was exiting the carmaker "for personal reasons" with immediate effect.

Daimler is replacing him with Markus Schaefer, who leads production planning at Mercedes passenger cars. According to Daimler, Renschler's exit was by "mutual consent" and "unanimously" approved by the supervisory board. "Given Renschler left of his own will, it needs to be seen where he turns up next. Maybe the right man to sort out Volkswagen Group's trucks assets," Arndt Ellinghorst, an analyst at ISI Group said.

Volkswagen’s truck, buses and van divisions have EUR35 billion ($48 billion) of commercial vehicles sales, while Daimler’s commercial vehicles sales are estimated at around EUR44 billion, ISI Global analysts said. "The question why Renschler is leaving is easy to answer. In our view his move from head of Daimler trucks to running Mercedes production was a step backwards," ISI analysts said in a note.

"Prior to his resignation, Renschler, who also sits at Daimler’s executive board, had been considered as a possible successor to current chief executive Dieter Zetsche. Renschler told The Wall Street Journal that he decided to leave for "a lot of reasons," including that the candidates for the CEO post "are all more or less the same age.”